Capturing images of diverse groups of people can be about more than who’s in front of the camera—certain skin color–based distortions have shaped the technology of photography throughout its entire history.

That’s the legacy that Dominique Mungin wrestles with in her role as Google’s Senior PgM of Product Inclusion and Equity. She’s worked on projects like the Monk Skin Tone Scale, a 10-shade spectrum developed in partnership with Harvard professor and sociologist Ellis Monk, and Google’s Real Tone tech, which aims to ensure cameras and image editing in Google products better capture darker skin.

Now, as Google and other companies push further into image generation and recognition AI, Mungin is trying to make sure societal biases aren’t similarly baked into the next generations of visual technology. Her team collaborated with stock photography company Tonl to supply more diverse imagery for training machine learning models. And the project more recently expanded to partner with Chronicon and Rampd to “source custom images featuring and centering individuals with chronic conditions and disabilities.”

Still, challenges persist. An entire subfield of AI is devoted to understanding and rectifying the ways the biases of AI’s creators and society at large play out in the technology, and Google has had its own problems in that area.

We talked to Mungin about her goals at Google, how biases have defined image technology, and the challenges of making AI inclusive and representative.

Keep reading here.—PK

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After several delays, much debate, and a voting meeting that involved more than six hours of public comment, San Francisco’s driverless-taxi companies took home a win last week when the California Public Utilities Commission voted 3 to 1 in favor of expanding passenger services in the city.

Google-owned Waymo and GM-owned Cruise have been operating in San Francisco with certain limitations, but both companies now have permission to charge for rides 24/7 anywhere in the city.

Previously, Cruise’s unmanned, fared rides were restricted to certain parts of the city between 10pm and 6am. Waymo wasn’t permitted to charge for unmanned rides, but could offer non-fared driverless services anywhere in the city (check out Tech Brew’s Waymo experience here).

Keep reading here.—MA

Coworking is a weekly segment where we spotlight Tech Brew readers who work with emerging technologies. Click here if you’d like a chance to be featured.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in tech?

I have two jobs at Microsoft: First, I’m a vice president in Microsoft’s Office product group, where I am accountable for the PowerPoint business, which includes PowerPoint on all major platforms, from Windows and Mac desktop machines to the web to mobile devices like iPhones, iPads, and Android devices. Perhaps more simply, it means if you have a bad experience using PowerPoint, that’s my fault, but if you have a great experience using PowerPoint, it means I hired the right team.

Second, I’m accountable for Microsoft’s Bay Area region, which includes about 4,500 employees representing engineering, marketing, sales, and venture capital. We’re spread across multiple campuses, including our newly built Silicon Valley Campus in Mountain View, California. Teams in the region contribute to virtually all aspects of Microsoft’s business, from consumer products to commercial products, from new products like Microsoft Designer to established products like PowerPoint, from software to hardware. We’re on the cutting edge of the tech industry, with a particular focus on artificial intelligence.

Keep reading here.

Stat: 25%. That’s how much TikTok parent company ByteDance’s revenue in China grew last year. Still growth, sure, but that compares to growth of “68% in 2021, 105% in 2020, and 150% in 2019,” The Information reported.

Quote: “It’s like the sound of a smoke detector battery going off.”—Russell Handorf, an engineer, on the reaction he has when he hears Slack’s “knock brush” notification sound, in a Washington Post story featuring helpful tips for limiting Slack interruptions

Read: It’s not just you, heat is making our smartphone batteries worse. Here’s why. (the Wall Street Journal)